My New Transport

Say "Hello" to my new P.O.S..(piece of shit). 

I am always saying to myself that this car is better than walking while driving this Nissan Altima.  This is partially true, with the exception of short distances.  This car is aweful.  I would have to say the worst part is the Continiously Variable Tranmission.  This car does not shift.  It just drones and moans and doesn't sound good.  I am amazed how many people own this car and put up with the daily moan the car makes.  It appears that it's going to take a month to fix my car so this auto will have to serve its purpose.

Carpool Lanes...Mixed Emotions!

In my opinion, the carpool lane (HOV) is a failure in Southern California. I don't know about other areas, but I do know for a fact that someone's idea to change social behavior and encourage strangers to carpool with each other does not happen and if it does, it wastes your time. Notice when you are in peak traffic and the carpool lane is empty and you are doing 5MPH. I know for a fact that if the carpool lanes were abolished, the average speed of vehicles would increase especially during rush hour traffic because the traffic would be spread out more evenly through the lanes. The facts that the average speed is low and makes us consume more fuel, generate more pollution, and even miss out on federal dinero. If we would be driving faster (even slightly) makes us burn less fuel, less pollution and gives us more federal grants! Not to mention you would be less pissed off because you would get home sooner.



On the flip side of things, I like the carpool lanes because no one is in them! Lately I have observed that there are few police cars in rush hour traffic because it isn't efficient to have your auto stuck doing nothing. I am one of those shits that drive in the carpool lane by myself. Especially if time is of the essence, and no one is in the carpool lane, and if a big truck is coming down! If you are going to break the law, I would suggest that you wait for a big truck or suv to block the vision of a "5.0" so they can't see you by yourself! You just wait patiently to get into the lane and wait for a truck and get in there before them!  Your only foe is the motorcycle cop.  They will come up on the right and look into your passenger mirror to see if there is someone there.  FYI. 

I have been violating the carpool lane pretty significantly for a couple of years already and I haven't gotten one citation for it!

Latest Update

So I got into an accident.  Actually it all went down on last Mother's Day on Sunday.  Consequently, I haven't been able to Yelp much nor add to my blog! 

Say Hello to my crashed Lexus IS350.  That would be 12k in damages.  No Bueno.

So I did injur my arm and back so I haven't been able to type that much. 

Ferraris in Pasadena

There were all these Pasadena earlier today and I want to share with you all what you missed out on. 

Here is a Ferrari F-50.  There were only 349 made.  You can check this one at the Peterson Museum.  These go for 700k+

This would be a 288 GTO.  There are only 277 made and cost north of 300k.

This would be a Ferrari F-40.  It has a very simiar engine as the 288 GTO (above).  1,315 have been made.

They re-visited the triple tailpipe in their new 458 Italia.

Check out the intercoolers of the twin-turbo V-8!  I wonder if the trunk cover gets dirty easily?

Here is another pic of it.  They really took care of this car.

Note the tiny luggage compartment.  Normally the spare tire goes there...

So, there were several other autos other than Ferraris.  More notably the coming of the new Mercedes SLS.  I really like this car for a couple of reasons.... this car comes from AMG from the start, its waaay cheaper than the old SLR, and looks better than the SLR!  I didn't expect it to get 20 MPG on the freeway!

These bozos opened up everything on this car. 

I wish I could have taken some pictures when it was closed up.

Mr. Issiz,  Thank you for making this Mercedes engine.

What is Gambling Exactly?

I would greatly appreciate it if someone would show me why governments shun gambling and demonize it yet there are many other types of gambling that are widely accepted and sometimes required. 

Insurance is gambling to an extent. You are betting that you are going to have an accident of some sort and the Insurance is betting that nothing is going to happen. I am amazed that there is all kinds of insurance. I wonder if they have insurance for insurance. 
Buying stocks is kind of like gambling: you are betting that a specific stock is going to go up in value.

Horse betting isn't a big deal, but for some reason (perhaps because of the animals) it isn't shunned. Has anyone mentioned to you what happens to the animal AFTER it's done with its racing years? If it isn't a good performer BAAAD things happen. You can read up on that in your spare time, but rest assured, its not pretty.

Buying lottery tickets is gambling. At least schools benefit (Some do I guess??). What I found intriguing is Bingo. I was floored when I found out about high stakes Bingo and that people drop a considerable amount to make money with this form of gambling. And no one blinks because everyone thinks that its just a bunch of grannies playing with pocket change.

Even starting up a business on your own is a gamble. My point here is that what makes these types of gambling any different than a casino with cards? Does the government think that casinos have an unfair advantage or that the people are too stupid? Or does it think that it would rather have people spend the money on goods that they don't need?

Regardless, my opinion is that you should be able to do whatever with your money and if you are too stupid to handle it responsibly, you deserve to be poor.

Just like I believe that there is a certain percentage of the population that should be renters. Not everyone is cut out for the responsibility for owning property. We had ownership in the USA at an all time high a handful of years ago, and to be in that club, all you needed was a mediocre 630 FICO. What people were not prepared for was the responsibility that goes with the property, and the dire consequences of constantly refinancing the property and cashing out.  I dare you to ask those people what they did with the money and they usually say the same "I don't know".  Wow.